Exploring:conceiving Value Management1 from my phd thesis2 on innovation. Innovation for the 21st Century. All CC-BY.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Who is doing Value Management?

Three Value Managers came to my attention today:

1. Following the Port Phillip Council : Have your Say page, lead me to Bang the Table, a private group building community engagement websites. Partly driven by Dr Crispin Butteriss PhD New England (Stakeholder engagement in public policy 1997 - 2003)

2. Bang the Table had created an interest group on Linked In (Online Community Engagement), which lead to NCDD.org (no not the North Dallas Chamber of Commerce, but) National Centre for Dialogue and Deliberation, established 2002, and now in 39 countries.

3. Lastly, the Victorian Churchill Club described one of their recent sessions (28 April) as Member Value Management. Collingwood membership manager described Value management processes. See a couple of quotes on the ValueMgmt twitter feed for details.

Australia should adopt the following national vision for broadband:"Australia will be a world leader in the availability and effective use of broadband, to deliver enhanced outcomes in health, education, commerce and government and to capture the economic and social benefits of broadband connectivity."

Goals (Section 3)"2. Australia should adopt the following national goals for broadband:(a) Broadband should be available to all Australians at fair and reasonable prices."

Encouraging Take-up"17. The Government, in cooperation with state and territory governments and industry stakeholders, should develop and provide detailed information to key sectors about the benefits of broadband applications, such as educational opportunities, improved health care, business process improvement, productivity gains and better government services."

So far, so good. What's the problem?

The problem comes from Paul Fletcher's (2009) book Wired Brown Land which suggests:

"Telstra was able to suppress the take-up of broadband in Australia for many years…. Telstra said that Australia's low broadband penetration was a symptom of an over-regulated industry.... In fact, Australia's low broadband take-up had a much simpler explanation. Telstra kept prices sky high. Once they fell, take-up rocketed." Fletcher 2009, p.227

Are Telstra doing Value Management? Well yes and no. Telstra were protecting their $8B annual landline revenue. SO Telstra were protecting their SHV (shareholder value), but unfortunately it came at the price of consumer/customer revenue, through delay, and higher prices. This thesis argues consumers adopt new technology when consumers see value, but high prices will delay adoption. Telstra provides evidence of this.